Monday, June 29, 2009

Rest in Peace, indeed

I've been kind of depressed lately. Too much this year. Instead of expounding on all of them I'll shorten it down into list form:-Trevor's Maternal Grandfather passed away-Trevor's Maternal Grandmother passed away-Trevor's family dog passed away-My mother's brother passed away. He's survived by his wife and young son.-My co-worker passed away. She was giving birth to her firstborn son. She never even got to meet him.-In the celebrity world a ton of people have died but the only one I cared about was Michael Jackson.

Is it lame to admit you loved a celebrity? If you're a child of the 80's like me you'd be lying if you said otherwise. You LOVED Michael Jackson. I loved it more as I got older actually. I loved "The Way You Make me Feel" and "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" and recently rekindled my love of "Off the Wall." I feel like a piece of my childhood just died. I don't really care how other people feel about him or the kind of person he was. I think it's pretentious to tell people they shouldn't grieve. If your heart tells you you're sad, someone preaching to you about how he's a bad person doesn't change that. If you miss him, you should feel free to miss him. Listen to his music. Remember how great he used to be.

Oh, and my parents will never stop telling people about how I used to rip off my clothes and diaper and dance to Michael Jackson's "Beat it." Apparently it was my jam and required me to remove all articles of clothing to really groove appropriately. Everyone has a story like that though. I lack the ability to be mortified because it totally sounds like something I'd do. My coworker told me about her grandmother having really long drapes that she and her siblings would pretend to be stage curtains and they would burst out of the drapes and dance as though it were a theatrical performance of "Thriller."

I guess what my point is, is that life is short. People you don't really expect to pass leave unexpectedly. People who you'd never imagine leaving this world and leaving their babies behind, do. It's unfair and you want to cry. You want to pound your fists against your desk and bawl for the baby who never gets to know how much his mother loved him. You cry because you wish you got to know your uncle better. You ache for his son who didn't want to celebrate his birthday with a big party because he was too grief stricken to celebrate. You weep for them, but you also weep for yourself. You weep because it could happen to you too. Death isn't fickle. It lurks behind in the corners.

I don't want to be morbid. I've just been dealing with a lot of things piling up all on top at once and I think it takes time to work through those feelings. You can feel quite war battered but all you can do is appreciate what you have. You have to hug your dad and tell him how much you love him and pretend to laugh at his story, which you've heard like 80 times. You have to call your mom and chit chat about this week's sale on butter. You have to take the time to visit your friends even if you feel guilty about letting your house look like a wild band of pigs have inhabited it.

Eh, I still feel bad about my house looking awful, but I just blame it on my husband's inability to tidy up on his own. haha. And then I hug him and enjoy a bowl of berry cobbler with him and think how lucky I am to have him.